Home

About The Mooring

Situated in a peaceful wooded setting on Cumberland Foreside, Maine, The Mooring’s location is minutes from Yarmouth and Falmouth, and easily accessible to Scarborough, Cape Elizabeth, South Portland and all of greater Portland and Southern Maine. Designed to serve the specific needs of those suffering with age-related dementia, Alzheimer’s Disease and other forms of progressive memory loss, The Mooring transcends traditional institutional care and nursing home models, providing customized resident-centric care, with programming designed to leverage cognitive strengths, to preserve autonomy and to respect individuality.

Our Philosophy

A gift of uncompromising care.

The Mooring on Foreside represents the evolution of specialized assisted living: a purpose-designed solution for individuals living with progressive memory loss. Developed over the course of a decade by an experienced team of memory care consultants, every aspect of The Mooring represents a best practice observed – or envisioned – in response to the needs of memory care clients – including those with Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of progressive dementia – seeking responsive, specialized care.

The Mooring is a home – and our highly trained staff is carefully selected to reinforce that impression. With staff-to-resident ratios among the highest in the industry, The Mooring’s staff members are much more than experienced palliative care providers. They’re familiar faces for both residents and their families, building caring relationships that transcend work.

What we're proud of...

The Mooring was developed to reflect the best practices in memory care-focused assisted living, providing a familiar, home-like setting that respects individuality, preserves dignity, minimizes transitional anxiety and transcends the paradigm of a traditional nursing home. Some of The Mooring’s unique features include:

Arrival & Setting

Designed to welcome residents and guests – and to eliminate even the hint of institutional care – the beautifully wooded driveway of The Mooring arrives at the door of a traditional New England cape. The larger portion of the facility’s intimate-yet-spacious structure extends behind the cape, with frontage on a beautiful backyard. From the moment each resident arrives, The Mooring feels like home.

Design

The Mooring’s layout, flow and aesthetic is designed to minimize the challenges and anxieties associated with each resident’s transition from home to assisted living. Every aspect of The Mooring feels accessible, comfortable and above all else, familiar.

Personal Space & Lifestyle

Each resident has his or her own private living space, enhanced with personal furniture and belongings. Individual touches, from plants to furniture to pets – are strongly encouraged to preserve a sense of continuity, familiarity and comfort. As an acknowledgment that we’re caring for adults in a transformative adult care setting, it’s our role to ease transition by creating a true home for every Mooring resident.

Living Space

While community spaces are shared, they’re designed to feel like home. We prepare all meals in our open family kitchen, situated immediately adjacent to the dining area, and just steps away from our comfortable, traditional living room. Natural light is also abundant, with walls of windows allowing views of our landscaped backyard, trails and the natural beauty of the surrounding forest – all fully accessible to our residents for supervised exploration, relaxation and enjoyment.

Programming

We make every effort to tailor each resident’s schedule to his or her personal preferences. At the Mooring, our recreational therapist works closely with each resident, seeking opportunities to provide meaningful, personalized programming that draws on familiarity – and reinforces a sense of relevance. We also encourage family input, and are enthusiastic about outside-the-box thinking, giving residents access to events and activities of special significance – from a grandchild’s soccer game to viewing a favorite play or musician.

Team

Familiarity and consistency is important to our residents. That’s why we work diligently to hire exceptional people, and to retain them by providing meaningful work and a satisfying work environment. Beginning the moment residents arrive, both they and their families will grow to know The Mooring staff well, developing relationships that provide everyday comfort and peace.

Meet The Mooring Team

At every level, The Mooring team reflects a unique, resident-centered philosophy dedicated to the distinctive residential needs of individuals facing progressive memory loss. With deep experience in clinical care, facility management and memory care consulting, we’re committed to identifying and employing those practices that help our residents to live comfortable, fulfilling, dignified lives.

Through the course of her career, Lynn has gained deep firsthand experience as both a caregiver and administrator in assisted living and dementia care settings. During that time, Lynn developed a clear sense of best practices, and founded Beach Glass Transitions to help guide families in their efforts to find appropriate elder care solutions for aging loved ones.

With The Mooring, Lynn has realized her dream: a tailor-made memory care facility that provides personalized care in a familiar, home environment – while leveraging practices proven to preserve the individuality, autonomy and dignity of every resident.

Nichole Lessard
Director of Resident Care and Administrator at The Mooring on Foreside

At a young age Nichole discovered her calling as a caregiver serving the elderly, especially those with dementia. Her love and passion for caring for those who needed her most grew, and she now has over 16 years of healthcare experience. Nichole’s work with people living with dementia has ranged from a nursing assistant to Charge Nurse and now RC/AL Administrator. Nichole’s experience and devotion to the elderly population in Maine will foster a setting where your loved one can truly feel at home and cared for in the manner they deserve.

“I believe strongly in treating anyone in my care as though they are family. At The Mooring on Foreside, I have found a place that will strive to provide nothing short of exceptional care, and you can expect to find the same.”

Halee Jandreau CTRS, CDP
Director of Therapeutic Recreation

A Certified Therapeutic Recreation Specialist and Certified Dementia Practitioner with a successful track record as a programming manager in residential dementia care settings, Halee has demonstrated her commitment to individualized, resident-centric therapies. Working with resident and family input, Halee develops personalized programming to preserve and strengthen the spiritual, emotional, physical, social and cognitive capacity of each Mooring resident.

“Our work focuses on each resident’s strengths in an effort to preserve a meaningful sense of identity, autonomy and self worth. And whenever possible, we make family and community contact an integral part of our programming.”

Brianne Metcalf
Speech Language Pathologist, Coastal Rehab

Coastal Rehab has provided one-on-one occupational, physical and speech therapy services to Maine’s geriatric community since 2005. Proponents of proactive therapies, they work to prevent injuries and slow declines to improve safety, ensure dignity, and enhance quality of life.

“When we welcome a new resident to The Mooring, we do a full cognitive evaluation to establish a baseline – and to identify each resident’s strengths. With that knowledge, we develop programming and therapies that preserve their highest possible level of independence and autonomy.“

Rebecca Dillon
Architect, Gawron Turgeon

Gawron Turgeon has earned special distinction for its work in the design and development of senior housing. The Mooring is the result of their unique ability to achieve residential familiarity – with state-of-the-art features that afford all the safety and support normally associated with clinical care environments.

“From a design perspective, one of The Mooring’s big differentiators is its size. Typically, assisted living and memory care facilities are scaled for much larger populations. Designing a twelve-bed facility was really gratifying – more like designing a home than an institution.”

Dr. William Wadland
Martin’s Point Geriatrics

Martin’s Point HealthCare has been at the forefront of a shift to a more holistic, preventative, patient-based approach to healthcare. For memory care patients, that proactive approach can significantly slow health, mobility and awareness declines to preserve independence, individuality and dignity.

“By focusing on personalized treatment, positive routine and a familiar environment, we can reduce reliance on the medications that are often necessary in less personalized care settings.”

Compassus Hospice is dedicated to quality, compassionate care, while providing comfort, support and quality of life to patients and their families. We deliver personalized care that puts patients’ goals and preferences at the forefront of their individual care plan.

“Although dementia is a difficult disease to observe as it progresses and a difficult disease to manage at times, with the efforts of a caring team, the resident and family can be assisted in maintaining dignity and comfort through the entire process.”

Care Partners

Carefully selected for their commitment to the unique needs of residents afflicted with progressive memory loss, our staff members often earn extended family status. And because continuity is vital for our residents’ peace of mind, we make every effort to retain high quality staff for the long term. As a result, you’ll have easy access to caregivers who know your loved one well. At The Mooring, you’ll see familiar faces every time you visit.

We’re also firm believers in the value of high quality training. That’s why each staff member at the Mooring earns full certification as a Dementia Care Practitioner. And to ensure a clear understanding and shared commitment to our care philosophy, all staff members also receive training in Teepa Snow’s revolutionary Positive Approach™ to Care curriculum, which has introduced a new person-centered paradigm to dementia care. Through the Positive Approach, caregivers develop an appreciation of each resident’s differences, and apply structured techniques to produce better care and support for those living with changing abilities.

When career opportunities arise at the Mooring, we look for staff members who share our passion for learning, our resident-oriented philosophy – and our dedication to exceptional caregiving. To inquire about career opportunities, we encourage you to contact us.

Awards

In 2017, The Mooring at Foreside was recognized by the International Interior Design Association (IIDA) at its 6th annual IIDA Healthcare Interior Design Competition. The competition, which honors and celebrates outstanding originality and excellence in the design and furnishings of healthcare interior spaces, acknowledges the Mooring’s distinctive, resident-centric design, which creates a familiar, homelike setting where residents can maintain social interaction and community involvement, engage in favorite activities and leverage cognitive strengths.

The Mooring at Foreside claimed top honors in the Memory Care category of the Senior Housing News’ 2017 Architectural & Design Awards. The competition, which drew more than 80 competitors from throughout the United States, recognized only nine projects for their unique approaches to senior living design. The competition was judged by a deep panel of architects and designers, and evaluates communities on design elements, community integration, amenities and lifestyle features.

Experience the Mooring

The Mooring provides memory care like no other. To learn more about our innovative, resident-centric approach to assisted living for individuals with progressive memory loss, we encourage you to contact us, and to schedule a visit.